Page 36 of Sincerely, Your Enemy

“To have fun. We deserve it after the year we’ve had,” Dia declares, the determination in her voice telling me there’s no changing her mind.

I nod and accept my fate. “Having fun it is.”

She starts going through the stainless-steel fridge and pulls out a bottle of chardonnay. “I asked Finn to bring this in case we stopped by.”

We grab a knife out of a kitchen drawer to cut the seal off the bottle, and Dia gets two red cups from the unused pile. She’s still pouring me a drink when a strong pair of arms wraps around my waist from behind and tugs me backward.

My back comes flush with a hard chest, and the large hand on my stomach drifts downward, locking around my hips to keep me in place.

The stranger’s mouth stops inches away from my ear. “Give a guy a fucking warning, rich girl.”

I stiffen up, TJ’s voice feeling like hot liquid coursing down my spine. I free myself of his embrace and whip around to tell him off. His piercing brown eyes nearly cut off my airways for a moment, but I manage to keep my cool long enough to say, “What?”

A smirk lifts his mouth as he drinks me in and says, “If you’re going to look like that, I’m going to need a heads-up. Every fucking guy at this party is going to be looking at you, and breaking my teammates’ noses wasn’t a part of my plans tonight.”

He seems to enjoy the shock on my face, because he adds, “Plus, no one’s going to believe we’re dating now.”

I cock an eyebrow. “And why is that?”

“Because if you really were my girlfriend and I’d seen you wearing that dress, we wouldn’t have made it to the fucking party to begin with.”

I need a second to recover from whatever the hellthatwas.

“There you go.” Dia hands me my drink, loving every second of this tension if the smile she’s wrestling is anything to go by.

“I… Thanks.” I bring the wine to my lips and take a long sip.

Dia and TJ exchange brief greetings, but it doesn’t diffuse the tension floating around us in the slightest.

“I’m surprised you came,babe.” TJ hooks his arm around my waist again and pulls me back in, but this time, we’re facing each other, and the proximity makes my stomach knot. He turns to Dia. “How’d you get her to leave the house? Bribery?”

A knowing smile spreads across my best friend’s face. “Something like that. I should probably go find my fiancé now.”

Then she leaves me alone with him.

Traitor.

I don’t let my anxiety show, staring TJ dead in the eye, as I say, “You don’t have to pretend in front of her. She knows it’s bullshit.”

He doesn’t loosen his hold on my body one bit, his gaze darting to something behind me before returning to my face. “Aaron doesn’t.”

I put the pieces together. “Is he…”

TJ lowers his voice to whisper. “Staring at us like he wants to feed my body to a pack of wolves? Yep.”

I scoff. “I figured he’d be too busy with Heather.”

TJ’s laughter makes my stomach clench. “She’s talking his ears off. But he hasn’t looked at her once since I came up to you.”

Goddamn it.

I’m attracted to him.

I don’t want to be, but I am.

I hope he’s not going to be this touchy all the time. I haven’t felt the warmth of a man in so long I just might go and do something stupid like want more.

“To be honest, I’m not even sure I like him anymore,” I confess.

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